Overland Journal Day 17-25: Albania, Greece and Turkey (Istanbul)

We reached the 5000-kilometer mark and crossed into Asia! Two major milestones for the expedition. Unfortunately, we also visited a few more car repair shops than expected. In this blog you read more about our time at the stunning Albanian coast, our quick visit to northern Greece, the work on the car and our unexpected city trip to magical Istanbul.

Albania: The Albanian Riviera

From Montenegro, we drove south to the enchanting Albanian Riviera with endless white beaches, mesmerizing bays and crystal-clear waters. Even though wild camping is allowed in Albania, we decided to book an apartment in the small seaside resort of Himarë. We had a lot of laundry and the luxury of an apartment for a few days didn’t sound too bad either. Our apartment was a stone’s throw away from the beach with a beautiful view of the sunset, for only 30 Euros per night. We lay on the beach, read some books, exercised for a bit and did our laundry. It was great to relax and take it easy for a few days.

There’s one thing that I learned in Albania: Albanians are good at marketing. If you look up pictures of Albania online, you see the most captivating landscapes with beaches and mountains. And while I’m not saying that those things cannot be found in Albania, I must add that there’s a lot more. Things you don’t see in the pictures. Dilapidated buildings, garbage, broken stuff everywhere, stray dogs, more car washes than you can count (most of them in questionable condition) and construction sites everywhere. Oh, and a complete lack of decent supermarkets. The only ones we could find were about 1 square meter and more expensive than in the Netherlands (!). I genuinely wonder where Albanians do their groceries. 

Wages are still relatively low in the country, especially by European standards. But prices are increasing rapidly. Albania is catching up in a sense. The government is investing heavily in building road networks, hotels and tourist facilities (hence the construction sites probably). And the tourists keep coming: last year the country got 10 million tourists, a third more than in 2022. So, the economy is on the rise, prices are increasing, but wages are still low. Quite a challenge for the locals.

After 3 lazy days by the sea, we decided it was time to get moving again. We drove almost all the way down south on the Albanian coastal road to Sarandë, a seaside resort on the border with Greece. We drove past the most beautiful bays with panoramic views of the sea. From Sarandë, we headed inland to the idyllic, Ottoman village of Gjirokaster. This village is also known as “the city of stone” because of its distinctive stone-tiled roofs. Due to its well-preserved Ottoman architecture, Gjirokaster is on the UNESCO World Heritage List. The crooked, white houses with black, stone roofs were lovely to see. But when we drove into the village on the cobblestone roads, we suddenly heard a rattling noise coming from the car. That didn’t sound good at all. So we decided to cut our trip short and drive to the nearest Toyota workshop, just across the border in Greece.

Greece: Thessaloniki

The Toyota workshop in Greece inspected the most important parts of the car, such as the engine, steering, suspension and brakes. But they couldn’t find anything out of the ordinary. The good news was that we could continue driving without any problems. They did tell us to go to a workshop after the weekend to check everything more thoroughly, however. It was 5 p.m. on a Friday, so all the workshops were closing for the weekend. We decided to drive to Thessaloniki, a pleasant port city with many historical ruins to explore.

Just before sundown, we found a camp spot on a beach towards the Turkish border. Although wild camping is officially forbidden in Greece, it was tolerated in this area. A German couple had been camping there for a week already, they told us. It was too late to set up camp, but we did it anyway. In the dark, with headlights on, we managed to set up our tent and cook dinner amidst a swarm of mosquitoes. Wild camping is not always romantic, but we knew that in advance. Once the dishes were done, we sat under the starry sky right by the sea. What a life! At night, the stray dogs kept us awake arguing who was boss, but we loved it anyway. Falling asleep to the sound of the waves is just magical.

The next day we left for Turkey. Our visa for Iran (if we still go there) is valid until May 5^th to enter the country, and Turkey is a huge country. We wanted to have enough time to explore everything Turkey has to offer. And we also had to find a good car workshop somewhere…

Turkey: Istanbul

On the way to the Turkish border, we called dozens of car workshops along our route. By word of mouth, we ended up at a good Toyota repair shop in Istanbul, Park Toyo. Although we didn’t plan to drive through Istanbul (we had been there twice before), fate had other plans for us. We sent a message to the workshop on Sunday evening, and they worked on our car all day Monday and Tuesday. It’s impossible to arrange something like that on such short notice in the Netherlands! The guys in the workshop discovered that one of the brake calipers was missing a clip, which might explain the rattling noise we heard earlier. We also wanted to have a heat shield installed near the catalytic converter, because the floor on the passenger side was getting pretty hot while driving. And there was a small leak in the cooling system. They fixed everything, but unfortunately the noise remained. After weighing out all our options, we decided to replace the front shock absorbers and suspension. One of the few parts we didn’t replace before the expedition. A costly exercise, but with results: the noise was gone!

Those few days in Istanbul were absolutely magical, there are worse places to wait for your car. We slept in a 4-star hotel with a gym, took the subway to the historic center, and drank countless teas in the car workshop. Somehow I always feel at home in this city. On the second day late in the evening, we got a call that we could pick up our car. It ran like new. The new shocks and springs made such a difference that we secretly wanted to replace our rear shock absorbers as well.

The next day we reached a major milestone for the expedition. We drove over the Bosphorus Bridge from Europe to Asia! It was a crazy feeling to drive to another continent instead of flying. Really amazing to arrive in Asia in your own car. A big green sign greeted us: “Welcome to Asia.”

After driving about 100 kilometers from Istanbul, we suddenly saw warning lights on the dashboard. Obviously, we were very disappointed because we were already too far to go back to the same car workshop. We stopped by a Toyota workshop on the way and waited for about 2 hours. It seems that a sensor needs to be calibrated after the wheel alignment they did in Istanbul. Or the sensor or ABS cable could have been broken during the work on the car. Unfortunately, the Toyota workshop couldn’t help us out, but they assured us that we could continue driving safely. We’ll look for another car repair shop soon. For now, we’re going to road trip the ‘turquoise coast’ of Turkey!

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